5
(Photo 2012 by Virginia Lawrence-Hope)
Modern Bank Building (100 North Third Street)
An Early Easton Hotel
The modern property occupies most of original Town Lot No. 148 along Spring Garden Street between North Third and Bank Streets (except a small carve-out for 327 Spring Garden Street), plus the southern 2/3 of the adjacent Lot No.149, as surveyed by William Parsons when Easton was established in 1752.[1] Lot No.148 (at the corner) was acquired by Anthony Rose from the Penn Family in 1789, with no indication in the deed of any building on the land.[2] For many years in the 1790s, an “old colonial limestone” tavern known as the Rising Sun was operated at the corner with North Third Street.[3]
In 1803, a retired blacksmith originally from Bethlehem Township named Philip Slough (also spelled Schlough or Schlaugh) acquired the property “in consideration . . . of the maintenance and support heretofore had and yet to be had and rendered unto” Anthony Rose. At that time, the property included a stone building – presumably the Rising Sun tavern at the corner with North Third Street.[4] “After conducting the business for about a year he discovered that the hotel business was rather strenuous for a retired blacksmith. He then transferred the hotel to his son . . . .”[5] In 1819, he also transferred to his son a portion of the Lot along Spring Garden Street that apparently lay between his stone house (at the corner with Bank Street) and the hotel previously sold to his son (John). At that time, the deed indicates that Philip Slough (there spelled “Schlough) had left Easton to become a farmer in Forks Township, while his son John Slough’s profession was now listed as a blacksmith.[6]
In 1821, a parcel at the Pomfret Street corner measuring 33’ (on Pomfret Street) X 150’ (on Spring Garden Street) was “seized and taken in execution as the property of Philip Schlough and John Schlough” and offered for sale by the Sheriff. At that time, it contained a “two story stone” house “being occupied as a tavern and is 33 by 36 feet with a stone kitchen adjoining 36 by 22 feet with suitable stabling on the lot, and other appurtenances”.[7] It appears that Philip Slough must have intervened to purchase the property from the Sheriff, because this corner property was owned by him directly in 1826.[8]
At some point, Philip Slough started to sell off pieces of his Easton property outside the family, apparently beginning with a strip on Pomfret (now called 3rd) Street to Philip Jacob Gagel.[9] Perhaps this was done to finance the retrieval of the hotel from the Sheriff. Gagel resold this land to William White in 1822.[10] White – popularly known as “Chippy” White – was the proprietor of White’s Hotel in Easton that catered to the “best” people.[11]
In 1826, John B. Schroeder acquired a log cabin on a 40’ strip of land to the North of White’s property,[12] and less than a month later purchased the stone hotel building itself at the Pomfret Street corner from Philip Slough for $2,200. The deed specified that Schroeder was purchasing “the Greater Part and Residuary Parcel” of original town Lot No.148. Schroeder, who had been identified in the 1826 deed as a distiller,[13] apparently then began operating the hotel himself.[14]
In the following year (1827), on 8 August, John B. Schroeder and “Chippy” White (who owned the property between John B. Schroeder’s two parcels on Pomfret Street) complicated the ownership map of this area by exchanging two small parcels of their land. White sold Schroeder a small frame house on a strip of land in the middle of his property for $200.[15] Schroeder sold White a “small . . . Piece of Ground” for the same price -- $200.[16] Many years later, White’s estate would pass that small piece of ground along to merchant Robert Cottingham,[17] White’s son-in-law.[18]
· Robert Cottingham’s son (and “Chippy” White’s grandson), William W. Cottingham, later became Easton’s Superintendent of Schools[19] for sixty years.[20]
In 1832, John Schroeder sold the hotel at the corner to James Hackett. At that time, the hotel property was a rectangle 100’ (on Pomfret Street – now North 3rd Street) X 220’ (on Spring Garden Street), with two corners cut out of it: the SW corner (Schlough House, owned by the Schlough heirs), and the NE corner, previously owned by William White.[21] Hacket had previously been the landlord of the Golden Lamb inn on South 3rd Street, where he was known as “an expert in his method of entertainment”, catering to “old customers” who returned “[s]eason after season”.[22] After Hackett went blind, the hotel was taken over by his family.[23] In 1845, the hotel property was purchased by Jacob Hagenbuch[24] (or Hagenbach), who changed the name to the Black Horse Tavern.[25] In 1851, Joseph Hagenbuch entered into an agreement with William Hackett (who still owned the adjacent property to the North) settling the ownership and mutual easements for an alley between their two properties.[26]
Hagenbuch apparently replaced the old stone tavern at the corner in 1852 with the much larger, brick United States Hotel.[27] This hotel was listed in 1855 as No. 40 North Third Street.[28] This expenditure may have been imprudent, however: the Sheriff seized the hotel from Hagenbuch’s estate in 1856, and sold it to Joseph Schortz.[29]
Boarder Ferdinand W. Bell
One boarder in Joseph Shortz’s hotel in 1860 was Ferdinand W. Bell, a carpenter then age 31.[30] He was also the captain of the Easton National Guards, one of four volunteer military companies in town.[31] After the news of Fort Sumter’s fall was received in 1861, he organized one of the first four companies that were offered to the army from Easton. Bell’s company became H Company of the 1st Pennsylvania Regiment.[32] [Other captains included William Armstrong (later a Lt. Colonel);[33] Jacob Dachrodt (later a Lt. Colonel);[34] and Charles Heckman (Company D, later a brevet Brigadier General).[35]] The 1st Pennsylvania Regiment was enlisted for only three months duty; it mustered out of service on 23 July 1861.[36]
Ferdinand W. Bell then raised Company B of the 51st Pennsylvania Regiment, and became its captain on 20 August.[37] The 51st Regiment participated in General Burnside’s expedition against North Carolina in 1861. It rejoined the Army of the Potomac in time to participate in serious fighting at the Second Battle of Bull Run,[38] where it was one of the few regiments to hold its line under repeated attacks”.[39] At the Battle of Antietam in September of 1862, the 51st Regiment “made one of the grandest and most desperate charges of the war” on Confederate positions at a stone bridge on the left of the Union line.[40] This was “one of the most famous and important charges of the Civil War.”[41]
This kind of gallantry under General Burnside’s command may have been partly responsible for that officer’s misjudgments as Commander in Chief of the Army of the Potomac at the Battle of Fredericksburg on 18 December. There, Captain Bell participated as captain of his company and acting major of the Regiment,[42] in the misguided and disastrous Union frontal assault against Confederate breastworks on the heights behind the town. During that assault, Bell’s right leg “was entirely taken off by a shell”, and he died of the wound[43] in two hours. He was buried in Easton Cemetery Plot E-334[44] “where a beautiful monument – the last grateful tribute of his friends – marks his final resting-place.”[45] In his memory, on 15 May 1868 the Grand Army of the Republic (a Civil War veterans’s group) chartered Bell Post 129 in Easton. By 1870, this post had over 500 members – “a greater number than has ever been claimed by any other Post in Pennsylvania.” Two of the Reeder brothers – Howard J. Reeder and General Frank Reeder – were members of this Post, and became Department Commanders.[46]
The 51st Pennsylvania Regiment was later part of General Grant’s drive on Vicksburg; and again with Burnside’s campaign against Knoxville, Tennessee. Almost all the men re-enlisted in 1864, and joined Grant once again for the Wilderness Campaign and subsequent invasion of Virginia that ultimately led to the surrender of Confederate General Lee’s army.[47]
The Samuel Hayden Hotel Years
Samuel Hayden became the hotel owner from 1865 until his death in approximately 1886.[48] Hayden kept the hotel “in the front rank of hostelries for many years”, catering to (among other things) Lafayette College functions.[49] The hotel was expanded in approximately late 1873[50] to incorporate the general store property next door.
· In the 1850s, partners Enos Lehr and Martin Frey kept a “general store” on this property[51] with the address of 42 North 3rd Street under the street numbering scheme then in effect.[52], and with his partner Martin Frey there, selling dry goods and groceries.[53]
· By 1860, Lehr’s partner at this location had changed to John Metzger,[54] while Martin Frey was selling dry goods in competition from a store at the SW corner of 3rd and Spring Garden Streets.[55]
· In 1874, when the modern street numbering scheme was inaugurated, Abram Sherrer apparently operated the dry goods store (assigned No.104) and had his residence above it (at No.106).[56]
· The next property to the North was apparently the residence and dry goods store (in 1880 a retail grocery) of Robert Cottingham, Sr. in both 1852 and late 1873, which continued into the 1880s.[57]
Boarder Howard J. Reeder
A resident boarder at the hotel during the 1880s was Howard J. Reeder.[58]
Howard J. Reeder (1843 – 1898) became a Judge of the Third Judicial District of Pennsylvania (1881-82, 1884-94) and of the Pennsylvania Superior Court (1895-98).[59] He was the middle son of Andrew H. Reeder,[60] a prominent Easton lawyer and the first Territorial Governor of Kansas.[61] Like his brothers, Howard Reeder also joined the Union army. He was initially enrolled with his younger brother, Frank, as privates in the “Emergency Men of 1862”in September of that year, as privates in Company I of the 5th Pennsylvania Regiment of Emergency Militia.[62] This Regiment was raised as part of the Governor’s call for 50,000 men, in response to General Lee’s “triumph in the second battle of Bull Run” and his brief invasion of the North in September 1862 that ended at the Battle of Antietam on 16-17 September. The Pennsylvania “Emergency Men of 1862”, mustered in on 11-13 September, were sent back to Harrisburg and disbanded on 24-27 September.[63]
Howard Reeder then joined the 153rd Pennsylvania Regiment (Lt. Col. Dachrodt’s regiment) as Adjutant on 11 October 1862. He was promoted to Captain of G Company on 29 January 1863.[64] He was wounded at the Battle of New Madrid (Missouri) on 13 March 1862,[65] and appears to have returned to live in the Reeder Family Homestead in Easton into the 1870s.[66]
After the Civil War, Howard Reeder returned to Easton to became a Commissioner of Fisheries of the State of Pennsylvania in 1873. He served in that office until he became a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas (Third Judicial District) in 1881-82 and again from 1884-94.[67] Reeder, a Republican, defeated Oliver H. Meyers, a long-serving incumbent Democrat. One member of the bar (Pennell C. Evans) travelling to Lancaster was asked there what had happened, since Easton was known to be an overwhelmingly Democratic town. He replied, “There was a contest in Northampton County between a hog and a gentleman for the judgeship. The gentleman won.” The remark got back to Easton, causing an estrangement between Meyers and Evans.[68]
While campaigning, Reeder served beer to potential voters. During a campaign meeting in South Easton, Reeder told a German Immigrant: “You can see how much better it is in this country than Germany. In Germany you could not drink with a judge.” The immigrant responded, “In Germany, you wouldn’t be a judge.”[69]
Reeder’s election loss (apparently in 1882) was close, run against an unappealing Democratic opponent. A clerk in South Easton was later heard to say that he had himself helped to destroy more ballots for Reeder there, than the margin of victory for his opponent.[70] Of course, that does not discount the possibility that similar efforts were being made, both for and against Reeder, at other polling locations at that time.
In 1895, Howard Reeder became a Judge of the Pennsylvania Superior Court, until his death in 1898,[71] at age 55. He is buried in Easton Cemetery Plot N-198, near his famous father (in Plot N-185) and brother, General Frank Reeder (in Plot N-220, 226).[72]
The United States Hotel After Samuel Hayden
After Samuel Hayden’s death in approximately 1886 (see above), his son Howard assumed control of the hotel.[73]
· His older son Edwin P. Hayden,[74] a Civil War veteran of Company E, 153rd Pennsylvania Regiment, died on 7 March 1887.[75] He is buried in Easton Cemetery Plot C-288.[76]
Howard Hayden had briefly been involved in the Keller and Hayden grocery store located (along with Howard’s residence at the time) in the Bachmann Publick House at 169 Northampton Street.[77] He had returned to clerking in his father’s hotel by 1880.[78] His management of the hotel after his father’s death met with such success[79] that he acquired The Arlington across the street and made it into an annex to the United States Hotel.[80]
In 1890, the proprietor of the United States Hotel was George H. Vincent.[81]
In 1904, Howard Hayden’s Estate sold the hotel to the partnership that operated the Kuebler Brewery, owned by three Kuebler Family sons.[82] In 1908, brewing magnate William Kuebler renamed the hotel The Karldon, after his two sons Karl and Donald.[83] Kuebler enlarged and improved the hotel,[84] and maintained it as one of Easton’s “most popular”.[85]